


Let's Dance

by AnagramRMX



Series: Random Prompt Fills [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: M/M, Undercover as a Couple
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-04
Updated: 2013-12-04
Packaged: 2018-01-03 10:30:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1069418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnagramRMX/pseuds/AnagramRMX
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fitz thought it would be fun going undercover with Ward as a couple.<br/>Then he found out that it was actually torture.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let's Dance

The restaurant hosted by the resort was far fancier than anywhere Fitz had gone on a date in his life. There were crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, casting beads of refracted light over candle-lit tables. The plates and silverware on their table was probably worth more than a month's salary from SHIELD, and the food was to die for.

Sitting at a table for two, Fitz felt almost out of place, like he should be at a cheap motel eating leftover Chinese food instead of at one of the most exclusive resorts on the continent.

As if his date could sense his discomfort, he put a hand out and covered Fitz'. He barely kept himself from jumping, and flushed as he looked over at Ward.

Unlike Fitz, Grant Ward looked completely in his element. He was confident and smooth as always, and smiled at Fitz gently as he took his hand. "You okay?"

There was a brief moment where Fitz struggled to breathe when Grant smiled at him like that.

"Y-yeah, great," he murmured quickly, smiling back weakly. "Not used to the glitz you are."

Ward looked amused, and squeezed Fitz hand for a second before pulling back. "You're doing fine," he assured him. "But we can go back upstairs if you want to..."

Anyone walking by could have heard the suggestion in Ward's voice, and the smile on Fitz' face grew. Honestly, he had been thinking of the king sized bed in their room since they had checked in.

All the same, he shook his head. "I'm fine," he assured his date, though he licked his lips lightly. "I think we can wait for that."

Ward looked back at his plate, hiding a smirk. Behind Fitz, one of the other patrons stood up, and Ward noticed that Fitz glass was nearly empty. "Let me go track down a waiter..." He muttered before standing.

As he left the table, Fitz couldn't help but grin at his luck. This was almost like a dream come true...

But when he looked over his shoulder to watch him walk away, he saw that the man Ward was walking after was a SHIELD target, not a waiter.

And he remembered it wasn't real.

(-:-)

Hindsight twenty-twenty, Fitz should have known that this was a bad idea.

_Never should have left the lab_ , Fitz thought to himself furiously. _In the lab, you don’t have to go undercover or get shot at or on fake dates with bloody gorgeous specialists…_

Fitz technically wasn’t even supposed to be on this mission.

When they received information that Richard Walters, an arms dealer on SHIELD’s watch list, was sighted for the first time in eight years, it was _Skye_ and Ward that were picked to go undercover at the special couples retreat. For the entire flight to the resort where Walters was staying, Fitz had watched jealously while Skye and Ward developed a backstory for how they became a couple, how they got married, and how it was their anniversary. They nearly perfected it before they landed.

And then they found out that it was a _gay_ couples retreat.

In the shuffle to get into position, Fitz and Skye had somehow switched jobs, and at first, Fitz had been perfectly fine with that. It was a week-long excuse to cozy up to Ward without reproach, pretending that they were the couple that Fitz wanted them to be. He knew it would never be real, but a few days would be nice anyway, right?

Then he found out that it was actually _torture_.

Grant was good at pretending for the sake of a mission. _Really_ good. Any time when they were amongst the other couples, he was the perfect boyfriend. He would go refill Fitz’ drink, reach for his hand when they told the story of how they met, and glared appropriately when one of the other guests made eyes at Fitz over brunch. He had even gone so far to kiss him on the cheek every time he had to leave Fitz alone for some reason.

Then they would go back to their room, and Ward would act like it never happened.

Which, technically, it hadn’t, but it still made Fitz’ heart frown.

From where he was sitting on their ridiculously comfortable bed in their suite, Fitz looked wistfully at Ward as he walked back in from the hallway.

“Replaced the bug,” he reported dully, sliding into one of the chairs nearby. “No problem.”

His tone was serious. More serious than he had been with Fitz since the day they met. Even more serious then when they had been on the run from Russian Border Patrol. A fact which made Fitz even more disappointed than the fact that they were just playing pretend. He had started really appreciating each and every honest smile he could get out of the specialist. The fact that he was reverting to his old self and cutting off his emotions _hurt_.

“That’s good,” Fitz muttered back, tapping away at the computer. “I’ve almost got his itinerary for the rest of the night.”

“Really?” Ward asked, leaning forward in the chair. “What’s on it?”

Fitz rolled his eyes. “Hold your horses,” he grumbled. “I said _almost,_ didn’t I?”

As he finished typing in the command, he didn’t look up to see whatever derogatory expression Ward was making. The computer screen pulled up the digital schedule, and Fitz coughed.

“Alright,” he started. “We just got back from dinner, five-thirty. Then he has an hour’s break…” He trailed off when he looked at the next one. “Dancing?” He looked up, his expression a little bit panicked. “They have dancing here?”

Ward didn’t seem at all perturbed by the news. “Yeah, in the ballroom near the front desk,” he answered, as if it were obvious. He started to stand up, loosening his tie a little. “They have a bar and live music.”

The expression on Fitz’ face didn’t go away. “Are we going to have to dance now?”

“Ah, yeah. We do have to blend-in in amongst people dancing,” Ward replied, slowly, again as if it were obvious. He turned back to Fitz with a raised eyebrow. “Is that going to be a problem?”

Yes. Yes it was.

“There’s a sixty-three percent chance that I’ll injure you if we have to dance together,” Fitz said sharply.

It was true. Not terrible injuries, but he had catalogued twelve incidents where he had nearly taken off someone’s toe while at a social function involving dancing. He was rubbish at it to begin with.

He was also incredibly concerned about the mechanics of dancing with Ward, which all implied that he would be crammed right up against the man’s chest. Just the mere thought of being that close and having to hold on to him as they attempted to dance made Fitz’ palms start to sweat.

Much to his dismay, Ward looked _amused_ at Fitz’ information. “You can’t be that bad.”

“Call Simmons. Ask her what happened at the New Year’s party at the academy!”

Ward cracked the tiniest of smiles before rolling his eyes. “Alright, alright,” he muttered, completely pulling off his tie with a smooth motion that Fitz most definitely was not staring at. “Stand up.”

Fitz mouth went dry.

“Wh…What?”

Ward made a motion with his hands. “Up,” he repeated. “We’ve got half an hour to make sure you don’t screw up while we’re tailing Walters.”

For what felt like an hour, Fitz made no move to stand up, and just stared at Ward. The expression that appeared on Ward’s face quickly got impatient before he grabbed Fitz’ arm and tugged him lightly away from the bed. “Come on, Fitz,” he said. “It’s just a part of the mission.”

As soon as Fitz got his footing, Ward started to maneuver their arms so that Fitz’ arms were on his back, and his own were at Fitz’ waist. Leo gulped as he looked over Ward’s shoulders.

_That’s the problem_ , he thought agitatedly.

“Alright, try not to look down and just follow my-“

He started to move forward at the same time as Fitz did, and they collided a little. Fitz scrambled to pull back, and for a moment Ward was quiet. When Fitz looked up to see Ward’s expression, it was blocked off again, and his lips were pressed into a tight line.

“Follow. My. Lead.” he repeated, looking down at Fitz, who nodded a little, and looked down. “Nope, eyes up.”

They tried again and only got a handful of steps in when Fitz tripped over Ward’s foot. Ward had to catch him before he fell over. They only finished the first three steps before Ward nearly tripped over one of Fitz’ feet, and had to shuffle them both to keep from stumbling into a wall.

He grit his teeth, and kept his hands tight around Fitz, only serving to make the other man more jittery. “Really?” he grumbled. “This isn’t half as hard as putting together projectile delivery systems.”

“I went to school for seven years to be able to do that,” Fitz mumbled back. “It’s not like I’ve had lessons on how to waltz.”

_It’s not like you’re distracting me or anything_.

Ward pulled back a little and looked at him seriously. There was a look in his eye that intrigued Fitz, but for the life of him he couldn’t figure out what it was.

It was a few moments before Ward opened his mouth. “Maybe when we’re back on the BUS…”

He trailed off, and Fitz raised an eyebrow as Ward’s eyes flitted over his shoulder.

“No time for more lessons, we need to go,” he said sharply, completely dropping Fitz and moving to get his suit jacket.

The absence of Ward’s close-proximity made Fitz feel cold all of a sudden. He turned around and looked at the television in the room, which they had set up to monitor the hallway around their target’s room. Walters and his partner were walking towards the elevator, evidently ready to go dancing for the night.

He sighed, resigning himself to the fact that he was going to have to dance.

(-:-)

The SHIELD agents quickly followed behind their targets on the way to the ballroom, staying far enough away that they weren’t suspected, but close enough that they didn’t lose sight.

Ward fell right back into step with their cover, smiling at Fitz brightly as they chatted about dinner and the last time they went dancing. Fitz smiled back weakly, annoyed at the pretend personality, and glad that Grant just thought it was because he didn’t want to dance.

When they reached the ballroom, it was already half full with couples. It was loud with music and laughter, and Fitz became anxious at the prospect of joining them.

He felt Ward grab his sweaty hand, squeezing twice to tell him that he still had eyes on Walters. “C’mon, sweetheart,” he said, not noticing at all how Fitz’ heart skipped a beat. “Let’s dance…” He looked over at his _date_ , smiling like he didn’t have a care in the world before tugging him into the throng of people.

Again he wrapped his arms around Fitz, and started to move on the dance floor. Fitz shut his eyes tight, and tried to focus on moving his feet right, not on how Ward was holding him like he never would in their real lives.

As far as the dancing went, he was lucky. He only stumbled once.

The downside was that Ward managed to cover it up by catching him against his chest, making it look like Fitz had intended to lay his head on Ward’s shoulder.

It made Fitz go stiff as they continued dancing together, but at the same time, he tried to enjoy it. If he was stuck on Ward’s shoulder, he didn’t have to keep his eyes on Walters. And when would he be this close to Ward again, after all?

_This is nice…_

Fitz would look up every now and then to see what expression Ward had put on his face now. Most times, he looked up just in time to see Ward’s eyes flit over to Walters, keeping his eyes on the target.

Other times made him smile. Ward would just be closing his eyes, a little and dancing. Even if the smile on his face wasn’t real, it was nice to think that this could be what he was like when he really was on a date. Happy, mildly relaxed. It was almost like Ward actually wanted to be there.

Ward’s eyes opened, and he looked down at where Fitz was still against his chest.

“You’re doing better,” he said, amused.

Fitz raised his eyebrows flirtatiously, playing along. “Maybe it’s just dancing with you.”

A laugh got trapped in Ward’s throat, and Fitz thought it almost sounded real. “You’re just saying that.”

“No, no I mean it…” Fitz responded, chuckling a little at how _coy_ Ward sounded. “Hopefully I won’t screw up enough to drive you off.”

Their eyes locked, and Fitz’ smile grew. Grant really was a good dancer, maybe it was him. Grant also had really nice eyes. He had no idea how long they danced while just staring at one another, but it was long enough that Fitz forgot what they were doing.

He was surprised when Ward stiffened and looked away, glancing around the room seriously.

After a moment he grumbled a swear. “Ah…I think we need to go back to the room,” he muttered, his voice a little more choppy than it had been.

“Why?” Fitz asked, starting to pull away from Ward’s chest, and sliding a hand down to grab Ward’s. “What’s wrong?”

“I forgot something,” Ward grumbled, putting on the face of the abashed boyfriend.

He caught Fitz’s hand, though, and squeezed four times, which meant that Walters was no longer in the room. Ward had lost their target.

Fitz’ eyes bugged. “You…you _forgot_ something?” he whispered.

“Yes…” Ward said, almost guiltily.

“What in god’s name made you _forget_?” Fitz was mind boggled at the idea that Ward had done something wrong on a mission. “What on earth-“

“Honey,” Grant cut him off, and looked at him before he could accidentally break character, but Fitz saw something.

For a split second, Fitz could see through Ward’s charade. Ward was embarrassed, almost blushing. He was stumbling to find the words to explain himself, and…

And his palms were sweaty.

Just like Fitz’.

Fitz’ eyes went a little wide, and his jaw dropped minutely as Ward focused on him. Even though they were in public, his super-serious face was back on, trying to cover up how he had gotten distracted by staring at Fitz.

“Let’s just…”

Fitz couldn’t help it, he let go of Ward’s hand and let it wrap around the back of Ward’s neck.

“Grant,” he interrupted, smiling a little as a vaguely confused look appeared on Ward’s face. “Don’t worry about it…”

Without stopping to think about it, he closed his eyes and quickly pressed their lips together. It wasn’t a long kiss, but it was long enough for him to feel Ward kiss him back, and long enough to get his point across without breaking character.

_I’m not pretending for the mission, you loon._

When he pulled back, he saw that Ward was fighting to not look surprised, like they hadn’t kissed before. But he was smiling.

“Maybe when we’re back on the…back home,” Fitz started suggesting dazedly. “Maybe we could dance some more, yeah?”

Ward got the same look in his eye that he had gotten when they were practicing in their room. He pulled Fitz back to his chest before answering, “Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that.”

As they made their way off of the dance floor, and off to track down Walters again, Fitz held onto Ward’s hand the entire time, and Ward didn’t put his mission-face back on at all when they reached their room.


End file.
